This is a pretty good overview of the work and career of Supertramp but who decided to leave out their masterpiece - 'Fool's Overture'. It's like a Zeppelin best of without 'Stairway to Heaven' or a Beatles Collection without 'A day in the life'. Also for newcomers to Supertramp it would be better to start off with the 'Crime of the century' or 'Breakfast in America' albums where the tracks are in a more natural order, the way the band meant it to be. For these reasons I can only give it three stars.

Supertramp were in some ways an enigma. Clearly capable of listenable pop songs, they also chose to deliver weighty and occasionally pompous tracks worthy of the prog rock era.

More to the point, they were capable of catchy, exciting and memorable songs with an edge but chose on occasions to repeat lazy 50s pastiche ballads which certainly does appeal to the soft rock/MoR community, even if that was not their natural home. When inspired, as on the Crime of the Century and Breakfast in America albums, Supertramp were capable of producing an amazingly high and consistent standard of music.

This collection provides examples of both, though it suffers slightly from the usual greatest hits syndrome, whereby tracks are selected because somebody deems them to be essential, not because they are the best (we might otherwise have had Hide in Your Shell and Asylum from CotC!) Make allowances for some so-so early work and the fact that the later material is lacking something after Roger Hodgson had gone solo (whatever became of his career?), and what is left?

The downside is tuneful throwaway numbers like My Kind of Lady and It's Raining Again, not to mention some early material but look harder and you'll unearth some real gems. Crime of the Century is still the prophetic masterpiece it ever was (a green song years before the term was coined?), driven by a Rick Davies piano, soaring sax from Anthony Heliwell and billowing strings. Look also at some lesser-known works - the jazz-funk of Cannonball and a magnificent extended live version of Another Man's Woman, for example. Within this lavish 2 CD set is a first-rate single CD collection fighting to get out - and that would have been worth the full 5 stars!

Although this is undoubtedly an excellent compilation, just a word of warning for audiophiles - the quality of this CD (2) is not as good as as the originals and certainly not as good as the relatively recent "remastered" versions of the original albums. Buy it to play in the car, sure, but not on a really good hi-fi system.

It's worth noting that there is some uncertainty over whether or not this is a "remastered" CD at all. It certainly does not promote itself, or list itself as "remastered" but in the very small print in the CD notes it says mastered in 2005. Personally I wouldn't want to claim this was a remastered disc!

It's just about impossible to find fault with this collection of Supertramp's best known tracks, either on a value or completeist basis, and it is certainly a better package than earlier attempts at a "Best of..."

The label "soft-rock" has been slapped on them largely as a result of the tendancy of their later albums to be made up of three or four minute US radio-friendly pop/rock material. Fans of the band at their peak, creatively and melodically, will say that the three albums "Crime of the Century / Crisis What Crisis / Even In The Quietest Moments", from which most of CD1 is made up, were definitely not soft rock (they will, in fact, probably argue that you should leave this release alone and buy the three individual CDs, and turn the volume up loud when you play them).

Rick Davies supervised the compilation and all the tracks have been digitally remastered. Comparing them with the vinyl originals does reveal a slight loss of edge and clarity but most people won't notice. Overall it's an excellent review of one of Britain's (yes, they were British) best rock bands of the late 1970s.

Supertramp in their heyday are as all of the writers below said but have a listen to what the band is doing these days.They have followed a more rock/jazz fusion path and all still done with very catchy melodies and brilliant ability on their individual instraments.Look out for the CD's 'Some Things Never Change' and 'Slow Motion'.